The Lives of the Caesars

A masterful new translation of Suetonius’ renowned biography of the twelve Caesars, bringing to life a portrait of the first Roman emperors in stunning detail

A Penguin Classic

The ancient Roman empire was the supreme arena, where emperors had no choice but to fight, to thrill, to dazzle. To rule as a Caesar was to stand as an actor upon the great stage of the world. No biographies invite us into the lives of the Caesars more vividly or intimately than those by Gaius Suetonius Tranquillus, written from the center of Rome and power, in the early 2nd century AD.

By placing each Caesar in the context of the generations that had gone before, and connecting personality with policy, Suetonius succeeded in painting Rome’s ultimate portraits of power. The shortfalls, foreign policy crises and sex scandals of the emperors are laid bare; we are shown their tastes, their foibles, their eccentricities; we sit at their tables and enter their bedrooms. The result is perhaps the most influential series of biographies ever written.

That Rome lives more vividly in people’s imagination than any other ancient empire owes an inordinate amount to Suetonius. Now award-winning author and translator Tom Holland brings us even closer in a new, spellbinding translation. Giving a deeper understanding of the personal lives of Rome’s first emperors, and of how they swayed the fates of millions, The Lives of the Caesars is an astonishing, immersive experience of a time and culture at once familiar and utterly alien to our own.

Gaius Suetonius Tranquillus was probably born in AD69 - the ＂famous year of the four Emperors.＂ From the letters of Suetonius’ close friend Pliny the Younger we learn that he practiced briefly at the bar, avoided political life, and became chief secretary to the Emperor Hadrian (AD117-38). Suetonius seems to have lived to a good age and probably died around the year AD140. Tom Holland is an award-winning historian, biographer and broadcaster. He is the author of Rubicon, Persian Fire, Millennium, In the Shadow of the Sword, and Dynasty. His most recent book, Pax, covers the heyday of the Roman Empire, from the death of Nero to Hadrian. His translation of The Histories by Herodotus was published by Penguin Classics in 2013.